Chapter 1
Room H
The bikes pulled up without urgency.
Engines cut. Stands dropped. Leather shifting as the riders dismounted. To anyone watching from across the street, it looked ordinary — men arriving somewhere they'd been before.
Inside, the receptionist hesitated.
She glanced at the screen. Then back at the men. Her fingers hovered over the keyboard a second longer than necessary.
One of them slid a card across the counter.
It wasn't flashy. No logo. No color.
Just a name and a number.
The receptionist's expression changed. Not fear. Recognition.
"Fourth floor," she said, already typing. "Room H."
They didn't thank her.
They took the stairs.
---
Christian woke to pressure across his ribs.
Not pain — restraint. Tight bandaging, pulling when he tried to breathe too deep.
His eyes opened to white ceiling tiles and fluorescent light. For half a second, he didn't understand what he was looking at.
Then the smell reached him.
Antiseptic.
Hospital.
His pulse jumped.
No.
He pushed himself upright too fast and had to steady his breathing before the room stopped tilting. The monitor beside the bed hummed quietly, indifferent.
He scanned the room.
Empty.
The boys were gone.
Good.
They'd done enough already.
Christian swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood, ignoring the sharp pull along his side. Someone had folded his clothes neatly and set them on the chair. His jacket was clean. His cuffs were still dark where blood had dried wrong.
They ran my insurance, he thought.
That's how this starts.
He stripped off the gown and dressed quickly, hands moving from habit, not panic. Button. Belt. Shoes. No wasted motion.
The bathroom door clicked shut behind him.
He turned on the sink and held his cuffs under the water, rubbing until the red thinned and disappeared. His reflection stared back at him, hollow-eyed, older than it should've been.
Footsteps passed in the hallway.
Then stopped.
Christian didn't look up.
If they'd come for him already, it wouldn't start with knocking.
The footsteps moved again.
Closer.
---
The door to Room H opened.
The first man stepped inside and reached back to close it.
Something white dropped over his head.
Fabric snapped tight.
He didn't have time to shout. His hands went to his throat as the cloth cinched, twisting, cutting off air in a single violent motion. The door slammed shut behind him as his body hit the floor.
---
Christian shut off the sink.
He stepped back into the room.
The bed was no longer where he'd left it.
Two men lay on the floor, breathing but unmoving. One had a bedsheet twisted tight around his neck, knotted with brutal efficiency.
Christian stood very still , checked his watch. It couldn't have been more than a couple minutes that he went to the bathroom
He didn't ask who did this.
Whoever it was had already decided.